NewPages Blog :: Magazines

I had never before read an issue of Freshwater, a journal produced yearly by the Asnuntuck Community College in Enfield, CT. In her “Editor’s Note,” Edwina Trentham is full of thanks, particularly to student editors who seem to be responsible for much of the journal’s production (as opposed to some lit mags who only allow students to be involved in the very early stages of selection, or just production grunt work). This note also revealed the dedication of the Freshwater team; many men and women clearly spent a great deal of time on this issue and I find this exceedingly refreshing. What’s better than a group of editors that care deeply about the selection and production process? Continue reading “Freshwater – 2008”

In a note from the editor, Elizabeth Quinn says that her “inspiration for High Desert Journal was to create a platform for artists and authors living in and inspired by a place that is often times overlooked for its cultural resources.” This journal accomplishes her intent: it shows that art takes place and that artists live outside major metropolises. Continue reading “High Desert Journal – Fall 2008”

This issue of the Indiana Review is about one thing: really good reading. An enormous number of very fine poems, seven strong stories, and a handful of well-written and often entertaining book reviews. Poems with special appeal for their careful, poetic (in the best sense of heightened, yet never arch or stiff) or particularly memorable language, and original and never purely self-serving imagery, like poetry contest winner Pilar Gómez-Ibañez (“Losing Bedrock Farm”) who has huge success with Richard Hugo’s inspiring advice “Think Small”; Joanna Klink (“Greenest”) who retrieves many overused and over burdened poetry favorites (rain, stars) from the dead metaphor heap; and Wayne Miller, whose poem in the form of a poetic letter to Auden is striking in its economy and restraint, which results in overwhelming in emotional power: Continue reading “Indiana Review – Winter 2008”

Putting together a literary journal filled with quality work is a challenging task. Putting together one issue of a journal with a theme is even more difficult. Launching a journal that hopes to focus on entirely on one subject must seem impossible! When I first heard about The LBJ: Avian Life, Literary Arts Journal, I was intrigued by the moxy behind it and simply had to check it out. Could this journal really be all about birds? Continue reading “The Literary Bird Journal – Fall 2008”

In this very last print issue of the journal POOL, which will become an online journal only at www.poolpoetry.com, the cover greets with two 1950’s children wearing star shaped sunglasses about to come out of a swimming pool, doused with the varying reflective colors produced by rippled water as a result of the sun. This image is joyous and playful and humorous and although not entirely reflective of every poem comprising this journal, it does represent a large portion of them. Whether the poems here are playing with the toy of language or the sounds it often emits, there is a kind of fun here at work, with an underlying seriousness of purpose or meaning jolting us back into reality.

Continue reading “Pool – 2008”

Reed is an annual journal from San Jose State University. This issue contains a few pieces of fiction, a lot of poetry, some art, a couple short essays, and interviews with Dr. Kenneth Coale, George Saunders, Dorothy Allison, and Gary Shapiro. Continue reading “Reed – 2008”

This all fiction issue of SMR is jam-packed with quality prose. From traditional storytelling to more experimental fiction, this issue covers the gamut. I was also pleased to see among the contributors a first time publication for a writer. Continue reading “Santa Monica Review – Fall 2008”

Could there be a better moment for a re-examination of the very notion of “America?” With a translation from the French of noted French art historian, essayist, and poet Yves Bonnefoy’s story, “America” (translated by Hoyt Rogers), essays on white poverty in the south (Wayne Flight), and on modernism and democratic pluralism, with a focus on John Dewey (Allen Dunn), and fiction that considers American family life (Brigitte McCray), I am tempted to say that the editors of this issue of Southern Humanities Review (SHR) predicted, months ago, our need to explore what is at the essence of American identity during the current time of turmoil and transition. Continue reading “Southern Humanities Review – Fall 2008”

David Wagoner’s “The Shape of My Life” got it right: “Three or four beginnings, four / or five middles, and two or three / regrettable endings”(except for the endings being regrettable – they’re not). This issue is all about telling a good story, beginning, middle, and end. More than a dozen poets, four fiction writers, and three essayists demonstrate the power of narrative, the rich possibilities of an original first line, and the satisfying resolution of a clever ending. Continue reading “American Literary Review – Spring 2008”

Finely etched is how I would define the work in this issue of The Bitter Oleander. Take Carolyn Gelland’s poem, “Wild Cat,” for example: Continue reading “The Bitter Oleander – 2008”

Within six months of placing a small ad in Poets & Writers, the editors of The Broome Review received more than 1,000 submissions to consider for this inaugural issue. They selected the work of 28 poets, including poems by such prolific and well known poets as Stephen Dunn, Timothy Liu, Lawrence Raab, and Philip Dacey; five fiction writers; and three essayists. Continue reading “The Broome Review – Spring 2008”

There seems to be general agreement that one of the better online literary magazines today is failbetter.com. They get their name from the short poem by Samuel Beckett: “Ever tried. / Ever failed. / No matter. / Try again. / Fail again. / Fail better.” – certainly a philosophy we could all fruitfully adopt. I am particularly impressed with the layout of this journal, where everything is easily accessible from the home page. The latest postings are found at the top, and scrolling down allows one to sample recent fiction, poetry, visuals, and interviews in a descending chronological order. The editors also appear to be rather selective in accepting new work: only six short stories are presented on the site from July 15 to November 4. Continue reading “failbetter.com – Fall/Winter 2008”

The fiction and poetry in this issue of Harpur Palate seems focused on examining the familiar through an exotic lens, and vice versa. In “Squander,” Jenny Hanning does interesting work with her reverently Kafka-esque premise. Katherine, a junior high English teacher and mother, wakes up as the family cat after a fatal car accident. Hanning makes good use of the material. She allows the playfully named Katherine to truly be a feline (she gifts her former husband with half-digested animals), and balances this with observations provided by her residual human perception. Continue reading “Harpur Palate – Summer 2008”

Hobart # 9 takes us back to our youth when video games were black and white, hookers were a few keystrokes away, playground ballgrabbing was cause for nasty nicknames, and mothers left fathers. The stories in this collection are as addictive as the games their characters play – pool, Scrabble, chess, poker, Jenga, blackjack, and Magic: The Gathering. Continue reading “Hobart – 2008”

I like the juxtapositions in this issue of MR. On the left hand side of the page is Karen Kevorkian’s poem, “Crowded Rooms,” with lines as lyrically wrought as “the white coned / datura whose tissue cup / I lifted and there / it would be rankly sweet / in a starving time,” and on the facing page Fancine Witte’s sudden fiction, “The Way the Vase Got Broken”: “Was the cat. First, he did his little purr thing, followed by his sinewy arch thing. This was all topped off by his jump thing and then that, was just that.” Continue reading “The Massachusetts Review – 2008”

Anyone interested in the present state of the literary journal, both print and online, should definitely consult the latest issue of the Mississippi Review. In the Introduction, the editors announce their celebration of the 100^th anniversary of the contemporary literary magazine, and say, “We devote this issue to an investigation of what the literary magazine has become and where it may be headed.” There follows a cornucopia of useful information. Continue reading “Mississippi Review – Fall 2008”

The official journal of the low-residency M.F.A. program at Murray State University, New Madrid “takes its name from the New Madrid seismic zone, which falls within the central Mississippi Valley and extends through western Kentucky.” Earthquakes within this region have caused the river to change course and after-effects have been felt as far away as New England. The quiet, honest intensity of the work in this issue is less explosive than a violent weather event to be sure, but powerful and lasting nonetheless. This issue includes the work of sixteen poets, including a special feature on “Emerging Poets,” four stories, an essay, and a couple of reviews. The work is steady, sturdy, and precise, careful work that takes itself seriously and encourages thoughtfulness and deliberate, attentive reading. Continue reading “New Madrid – Summer 2008”

Published at St. Jerome’s University in Waterloo, Ontario, The New Quarterly is a handsome journal, obviously produced with great care, respect for the relationship between good reading and good design (short columns! white space!), and an appealing shape (think Brick or Tin House, but less bulky). I spent a long time appreciating the magazine’s physical appeal before I even began to take in the exceedingly good contents. Editor Kim Jerrigan tells us this issue’s theme is “Assorted Pedestrians,” a line from one of the stories featured in the issue, a theme borne out by intriguing photos of “human subjects” from Jonathon Bowman on the cover and title page. Continue reading “The New Quarterly – Fall 2008”

How exciting to come across something new! Well, after 31 issues, this dynamic little magazine isn’t new, but I confess I had never seen it before – it’s not always easy to find British publications in US bookstores. This terrifically satisfying journal comes from Liverpool (with contributors this issue from Belfast, Liverpool, Australia, Oxford, and Lancaster). “New writing/book talk/news and reviews” is how The Reader accurately characterizes itself. Continue reading “The Reader – Autumn 2008”

The cover of this issue is a delightful reproduction of a painting (oil on wood) by Jayne Holsinger whose closely examined human subjects share the vivid spirit and astute observation of much of the writing in this issue of The Saint Ann’s Review. Holsinger’s paintings are so finely etched and so sharply defined, it’s hard to believe they are created in oils. The work of 13 poets, 10 fiction writers, two essayists, an “e-interview,” several reviews, and strong artwork by three other artists match Holsinger’s gift for original and memorable image making. Continue reading “The Saint Ann’s Review – Number 8”

This issue of Slipstream includes the work of four-dozen poets, many of whose bios (though admittedly not all) are among the quirkiest you’ll find. Jane Adam of Buffalo, NY, “is more liquid than solid and leaves behind the hyaline purity to melt under streetlamps.” Jon Boiservert of Corvallis, OR, “throws up a lot.” J. Blake Gordon of Evanston, IL, “sleeps soundly, thinks about music, prepares simple meals, and watches a little television.” Toni Thomas of Milwaukie, OR, lives with “two energetic children.” Continue reading “Slipstream – 2008”

The Southeast Review is a true literary variety journal, with strengths of selection across all genres. The fiction is dominated by strong character stories and relationship observations, not so much on place. Even Kevin C. Stewart’s “Baton Rouge Parish” is less about NOLA and more about a couple’s relationship, which heats up when unsolved murders are splashed across the media. “The Rooftop” by Sarah Faulkner turns the coming-of-age theme on its head with this story of three sisters attempting to out-sex one another. It’s insightful and so real it almost hurts to keep reading. “Fourteen Carousels” by Fulbright Jones and “The Travel Writer” by Joey R. Poole, the other fiction in this collection, are similar in that they are gutsy, human, and at times hurt our reality check centers. Continue reading “The Southeast Review – 2008”

The editor of Thema announces themes a year or more in advance. So, when Virginia Howard chose “When Things Get Back to Normal” thinking of her house and her life in Louisiana in the post-Katrina years, she could not possibly have known how much many more of us would be longing for “normal” in Autumn 2008. “For us, things will never get back to normal. We are trying to forge new versions of normal,” she writes in her introductory notes. Continue reading “THEMA – Autumn 2008”

The Dream People is one of those online anomalies that is simply laugh-out-loud funny and it knows it. Not that this is a bad thing. The apex of this journal’s mission is to perplex, astound and cause general hilarity at the antics that take place in its various fantastical fictional narratives, novel excerpts, creative nonfiction, nonfiction, micro-criticism, reviews, flash interviews and even artwork. In this satirical and ghostly world, what is real is dressed up in metaphorical and allegorical costumes sometimes subtle, sometimes obvious, for the readers to deconstruct and find whatever meaning that they are searching for. Continue reading “Dream People – 2008”

Ecotone: eco from Greek oikos (a house or dwelling) + tone from tonos (tension). All Ecotone’s writing is true to this theme, in one way or another. This issue opens with a creative nonfiction piece by the editor, David Gessner, in which he recounts his own experience in an ecotone, a transitional place between two communities, as well as a place of danger. Jessica Bane Robert’s memoir, “Dark on the Inside,” about living in the Maine woods with alcoholic parents, is full of both natural beauty and sadness. And Michael Pollan’s lighter “Dream Pond” demonstrates how hubris leads to humiliation, then eventually knowledge and appreciation. This essay follows an engaging interview with Pollan, the author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma and, most recently, In Defense of Food. Continue reading “Ecotone – Spring 2008”

Eratio states that it “publishes poetry in the postmodern idioms with an emphasis on the intransitive,” which I take to mean that the poetry submissions it accepts are not conventional and are experimental with a focus or sentence structure that disconnects from the norm of verb/direct object relationship of sentence construction. A journal that insists upon a literary affectation of this kind could lend itself to stilted prose that sounds as if it removes certain language constraints just to be different. However, in this situation, it shows both the reader and the writer of poetry what possibilities it offers in tone and voice and overall flow of the poems. Continue reading “eratio – 2008”

Free Verse is an experimental poetry forum for poets that do not follow the normal tenets of form and structure, reveling instead in modern and post-modern tendencies to deconstruct the sentence or line and turn it on its head so that the meaning seems like a coded message scattered in the form of extreme line breaks or unconventional prose-like formations. Rhyme and meter are not ignored here entirely, they are just pushed aside for new and tantalizing artistic configurations that stray from structural traditions, if not always-topical ones. Continue reading “Free Verse – Spring 2008”

Front Porch is a online journal of informative and plentiful works of fiction, poetry, reviews, nonfiction, interviews, and audio visual that are gratifying and engaging to the intellect. Continue reading “Front Porch – 2008”

It has been said that Americans don’t read enough foreign literature, and I am inclined to agree with this statement, given that most people in the United States can identify Ernest Hemingway and Huckleberry Finn readily enough, but not Leo Tolstoy or Madame Bovary. What a shame. Gowanus, a resolutely international online literary journal, attempts to broaden one’s horizons. They state they are “interested in what concerns human beings in Delhi, Bridgetown and Soweto as well as in Chicago, Dublin and Tokyo.” Judging from their archives, they have effectively been doing so since 1997. Continue reading “Gowanus – Winter 2009”

With the explosion of online literary journals over the past several years, I have found myself becoming particularly attached to those which are pleasing to the eye, well organized, and contain interesting and well-written prose and poetry. On all of these counts, the Kennesaw Review, which has been in business since 2000, acquits itself well.

Continue reading “The Kennesaw Review – 2008”

Since its beginnings 1998, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern (or simply McSweeney’s) has maintained its reputation as one of the most innovative literary journals in publishing today. Continue reading “McSweeney’s – Fall 2008”

Ruminate’s layout is beautiful: almost trade magazine size but sturdier, writing centered on white or grey or black pages, Evan Mann’s creation sketches littered between poems and an essay and a short story. The journal’s writing is equally beautiful, pieces which demonstrate faith inside literature as well as faith in literature, a faith that literature can explain and inspire. Continue reading “Ruminate – Fall 2008”

Many Americans read little from emerging foreign writers. The St. Petersburg Review, an excellent anecdote to this situation, offers translations of Russian writers into English, or English writers into Russian. The latter pieces are of particular interest me, since Russian is almost never found in American literary magazines. Any student of Russian should pick up a copy and check out the Russian translations of Maxine Kumin’s poems scattered throughout the journal – poems which haven’t yet appeared in Russia. Continue reading “St. Petersburg Review – 2008”

The “pop flotsam” and “cultural jetsam” captured between the covers of Barrelhouse offers the best of both worlds. The material is literary and meaningful while simultaneously maintaining broad appeal. The “Barrelhouse Editorial Squadron” consists of self-proclaimed “misfits,” and they have found a number of beautiful red-haired stepchildren for this issue. Continue reading “Barrelhouse – 2008”

The theme for this issue of The Bloomsbury Review is “Writing the Land,” and its book reviews primarily dwell on nature or regional writers across the United States. The lead review describes two Wallace Stegner biographies – Wallace Stegner and the American West and Wallace Stegner’s Salt Lake City – as well as The Collected Letters of William Stegner. Reviewer Tom Wylie compares Stegner’s work to that of Twain, Faulkner, and Steinbeck, and calls him “one of our great American writers.” Wylie blends Stegner’s biography with the review of these new books, resulting in a survey of Stegner both as a man and as a writer. Continue reading “The Bloomsbury Review – July/August 2008”

The Burnside Review’s CD-case size fits snugly in my purse, a place from where I’ve pulled and read it the last couple weeks, despite the fact the issue is all about LA, and I’m a snobby Portlander. Sid Miller, Burnside Review’s editor, acknowledges the Portlander’s aversion to LA, then shows it’s unfounded – at least literary-wise – by including excellent LA writers and writing. Continue reading “Burnside Review – 2008”

This issue of College Literature is devoted to essays that examine the intersection between law and literature. The essays make the case that the law often influences literature, but more importantly, that literature can effect change in the law. Continue reading “College Literature – Summer 2008”

Dogzplot is an amalgam of eclectic and varying styles of literary excellence publishing fiction, flash fiction, creative nonfiction, artwork, opinion pieces, poetry and even photos (which are requested to be works that are not necessarily “good” or polished as polished can be, but works that will “blow our fucking minds”). When you read this journal, you will quickly realize that it is an energetic environment where the humorous and the serious artwork, writing and photography can coexist with the ironic, sardonic and satirical pieces that dominate this daring journal. And you may not know where the bones are buried in this unique universe, but rest assured you are one happy dog. Continue reading “Dogzplot – Fall 2008”

Ducts, a self-proclaimed “webzine of personal stories,” lives up to its hype in that the narratives that inhabit its confines smell of truth in one way or the other, especially when it comes to the lives and relationships of its central figures. Whether it is in essay, memoir, fiction, through the lens of its art gallery or in a poem, there is an emotional component that grips and excites. Continue reading “Ducts – Summer 2008”

There is a lot of very inventive work in this issue that deserves attention, and I promise not to ignore or overlook it, but bear with me if I must begin with the understated – Aaron Giovannone’s perfect little prose poem: Continue reading “Event – 2008”

The best way to describe this issue is rich – there is a simply a lot here to take in: a short play, a graphic short story/essay, a portfolio of poems by international poets (Writers in Residence in the writing program at Iowa), short fiction, poems, reviews, and several short prose pieces that might straddle the literary space between fiction and nonfiction (they are not labeled and might easily be construed as one or the other). Lyn Lifshin’s “April, Paris,” is representative, at least in terms of tone, of much of the work in this issue: “Nothing would be less shall we call it what it is, a cliché / than April in Paris. But this poem got started with some / thing I don’t think I could do but it reminded me of / Aprils and then three magazines came with Paris / on the cover.” The “message,” here too, is not a bad summary of the issue’s overall impact: things probably look more like April in Paris than they actually are, just keep reading and you’ll see what I mean. Continue reading “The Iowa Review – Fall 2008”

Under the direction of faculty members Matthea Harvey and Martha Rhodes, talented poets in their own right, students at Sarah Lawrence College produce this terrific journal, now in its seventh year. Current and former Sarah Lawrence teachers, undergraduate and MFA students (Gery Albarelli, Lucy Cottrell, Gillian Cummings, Kathy Curto, Todd Dillard, Thomas Sayers Ellis, Robert Perry Ivey, Marie-Elizabeth Mali, Stuart Spencer, Alexis Sullivan, Tricia Taaca, and Chris Wiley) are joined by an impressive group of poets, nonfiction and fiction writers, and photographers unaffiliated with the college, including Nick Carbó, Denise Duhamel, Eamon Grennan, and Paul Muldoon, among others. Nonfiction contest winner, Seth Raab, whose piece, “Heart Failures” was selected by Mark Singer, makes his first ever appearance in print here. His essay is tender, lovingly constructed, and expertly paced, so let’s hope this is the first of many successes. Continue reading “Lumina – 2008”

Journalist and filmmaker Tadzio Richards won the magazine’s 2008 Far Horizons Award with “Travels in Beringia,” selected from more than 500 entries and featured in this issue. It’s an odd time, to be sure, to be reading about the “sea frozen with chipped ice” that lies between Siberia and Alaska (which mentioned more in the news media in the US in 2008 than it likely was in the entire century before the last presidential election). Continue reading “The Malahat Review – Fall 2008”

Often one of the best things about Poetry is the prose, which is the case this month in which letters, essays, and reviews comprise nearly half the issue. Prose contributions include an excerpt from Words in Air: The Complete Correspondence of Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Bishop, an essay on reviewing Hart Crane by William Logan, and reviews of new books by Jason Guriel. Logan’s essay is a thoughtful, if mildly self-serving, “response” to critics of a controversial review he wrote for the New York Times last year. Continue reading “Poetry – October 2008”

After a seven-year break, The Prague Revue is back. The journal, which categorizes itself as “Bohemia’s Journal of International Literature,” is a compact little tome, just right for a bohemian life of travel. And if you’re about to set out on a trip, I certainly recommend you take this issue with you. No matter how long the lines at the airport, you’ll never be bored. Produced under the auspices of the Prague Cultural Foundation in the Czech Republic, the journal presents fiction, essays, poetry, drama, and reviews in English (some written in English, others translated from their original languages) from around the world. This issue features work, including a short play and photographs by writers from the US, China, the Czech Republic, Scotland, Belgium, Ireland, England, and Germany. Continue reading “The Prague Revue – 2008”

In her introductory note, the editor says she hopes the reader will “find both the wretchedness that makes us human and the grace that will ring.” This “Journal of Literature, Art, and Faith,” the final issue of Rock & Sling, fulfills the editor’s vision through stories and poems of both cruelty and assistance. Some of the pieces are blatantly Christian; other pieces indirectly display the Christian themes of suffering, grace, justice and redemption. Continue reading “Rock & Sling – Summer 2008”

This is the “political issue,” which I am reading just prior to the election, and I am, paradoxically, glad, almost relieved to find the sad ironies (The title page quotes John F. Kennedy, “The United States, as the world knows, will never start a war”), popular truths (the Editor’s Note begins with the old bumper sticker adage, “If you’re not pissed off, you’re not paying attention.”), and delighted to find that Tin House is as provocative as ever, especially when we need it most. Continue reading “Tin House – Fall 2008”

Guest editor Henry S. Bienen’s theme is “the other,” the “real or presumed differences” between us, which he categorizes, by way of partial example, as: race religion, language, country of origin or birth, region, geography, clan, tribe, caste, family, class, social status, income, occupation, age, gender, sexual preference, style of dress, or hairstyle. He has selected nine essays, four stories, the work of three poets, a powerful portfolio of photos by Fazal Sheikh, and additional photos by Jeremiah Ostriker, all of whom convert these categories of identity into work that reflects these definitions’ inadequacy when it comes to knowing the real people and circumstances of which our diverse world is comprised. Continue reading “TriQuarterly – 2008”